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Much of management is resolving emotional blocks and relationship
issues,
often starting with
your own ...
Human Relationships are Complex Systems
Most people communicate within a hierarchy
of relationships - from casual meetings
with strangers, through friendship, teamwork, partnership and
parenthood to community and national leadership.
Human relationships are subject to many rules, including
personal habits, family traditions, government laws and ethnic customs.
For each relationship type there are culturally appropriate skills and a
spectrum of intimacy (or displays of affection) between the members.
Human systems can be better comprehended
by people who understand how their own families have been affected
by the actions of their ancestors and by extended family members. People who do
not understand their own families may have difficulty perceiving relationship
dynamics.
Coaching motivated adults can include helping people define
and fulfill:
- their own individual goals
- the goals (expectations)
of other people
- cooperative relationship goals (e.g. friendship, partnership)
- cooperative systemic goals (e.g. families, teams, communities)
Relationship Management
Do you want or need to assess human systems,
recognize challenges, identify potential problems, implement solutions and test their effectiveness? Managers need
these and other relationship
skills. (In my experience, most of my students know less about their own
family and team dynamics than any family or team that they study or coach.)
Where there are relationships there are potential problems.
Effective managers recognize and solve relationship problems daily. Although the
consequences of relationship problems may be easy to recognize, it is often
difficult to perceive the underlying causes of those problems.
Many relationship problems result from ignorance about the
rules that apply in families, groups or organizations. In many
relationships there may be taboos against discussing relationship rules. This
may include a taboo against discussing a taboo against
discussing relationship rules.
Identify, Test and Implement Potential Solutions
Superficial analysis of relationship problems is often
followed by superficial solutions and good advice, with
limited, short-term effects and sometimes detrimental consequences.
Superficial solutions - whether organizational or family - can
hurt all members of a relationship system.
Systemic diagnosis helps a coach decide which modality is
best suited for specific issues. Our coaching ideal is that all significant
members of a system be at least satisfied with a change.
Systemic Rules
Systems theory provides a basis for
understanding relationships between genders and generations.
Social scientists seems to ignore individual
qualities and systemic rules, focusing instead on population statistics.
But if individual and systemic excellence are smeared across populations,
then social sciences can only be sciences of mediocrity.
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One key to our relationship coaching is to acknowledge
all members of a system - including past, dead or disgraced members - and to
accept their actions,
contributions,
responsibilities, beliefs, values and personalities.
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If members of a human system are ignored, forgotten or dishonored,
consequences manifest as depression, mental health symptoms, fixations and obsessions. This applies even if subsequent
generations are not consciously aware of whatever occurred previously.
Many symptoms appear to be related to relationship
disappointments. Children of people whose ancestors were persecuted often appear
to carry or reflect the emotional burden from their parents or ancestors.
Common symptoms
include depression, fear, self-criticism, guilt and self-hatred.
- Unspoken rules guide spoken communication
- Systems can maintain patterns and violence and harm
- Maturity may represent a threat of loss to a human system
- A system's primary resources are the relationships
between its members
- A system includes all system members, including those
who are missing or dead
Disruption of Relationship Systems
Disrupting a relationship system often results in entangled
members and strong, apparently irrational, emotions. Common entanglements include identification with perceived
victims or with dead members.
People who feel unpleasant emotions may reject their
relationship systems as they attempt to gain freedom and
independence. But entangled people may be unable to move on with their lives.
Many cannot form, or even look
forward to, healthy, happy relationships - for example they may freeze in their family
systems and express their entanglements as immature or dysfunctional behavior.
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Members of human relationship systems may
experience unpleasant emotions if:
- previous partners are not respected
- children or young adults who die are not honored
- family members are not trusted with family secrets
- those who risk lives or die in wars are not acknowledged
- children given away for adoption may not be acknowledged
- aborted, miscarried or stillborn babies are not acknowledged
- the biological parents of adopted children are not acknowledged
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System Goals
Although the goals of a human system may seem obvious;
systemic goals cannot always be predicted from cultural, ethnic, class or
educational background. Friendship may be faked to access resources. Some
people lie to join a team. A marriage may be forced by some emergency.
A business may function as a make-work project or deliberately lose money for
tax purposes. Countries may fight wars that only benefit the leaders.
Nevertheless, human organizations do evolve more or less
predictably. The evolution of human systems may best be predicted by the
work of Dr Clare Graves.
The New Coach
Inexperienced coaches may be unable to help their clients
achieve their success. Motivation is never enough for lasting results - much
more is needed. We coach our students to become role models and mentors - not
only exploring what other
people want, but demonstrating in their own lives how to solve emotional and
relationship issues and offering people specific choices.
(Many of our students try to repeat the questions and phrases
that we use in demonstrations, in the hope that they may acquire some
of our results. While this seems positive in principle, we notice that students who believe
that they can so easily duplicate our skills may damage
people. Systemic coaching is a lot more than asking questions.)
Demonstrations
If you watch one of us demonstrating systemic
coaching, even with people who are not students and do not know what to expect,
it may seem easy. Some people feel that they could do similar coaching after watching
one or two demonstrations. Maybe surgery also looks simple to the unskilled.
Modeling trainers during demonstrations can be an effective way
to learn ... IF demonstrations are supported with precise, detailed predictions
and analysis of the strategies demonstrated. We demonstrate our competence in
real time, with predictions, commentaries and analysis. We discuss what we
intend to do before a demonstration; what we do during a demonstration; and
break down what we did after a demonstration. This seems to be rare in training
for the helping professions.
Our students receive many experiences of modeling, and we encourage our students
to participate in class exercises, to test their understanding and provide
feedback. We assume that people are much more than biological, rational and communicating
beings. We help people change emotions, behavior and relationships over time and
even across generations.
Do you want to dissolve emotional blocks
and relationship issues?
Online Coaching & Training
Plagiarism is theft. Copyright © Martyn Carruthers 2004-2012 All rights reserved.
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